


Gravitation

by Odsbodkins



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: First Time, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pre-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-05
Updated: 2014-04-05
Packaged: 2018-01-18 07:04:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1419140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Odsbodkins/pseuds/Odsbodkins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He couldn't remember when he first started feeling the pull. Perhaps it was too long ago, or perhaps it had been gradual, something that crept up on him. But by the time he was sixteen, Bucky knew that the axis of his world spun around Steve Rogers in the worst possible way." </p>
<p>Inspired by finding out that in the prequel comics for Captain America: The First Avenger, Steve and Bucky are in art class when the news breaks about Pearl Harbor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gravitation

**Author's Note:**

> This is in canon with Captain America: The First Avenger and its prequel comics; it is not in canon with Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

He couldn't remember when he first started feeling the pull. Perhaps it was too long ago, or perhaps it had been gradual, something that crept up on him. But by the time he was sixteen, Bucky knew that the axis of his world spun around Steve Rogers in the worst possible way.

He _wanted_. It was under his skin, in his chest, in his gut, ran down his spine and into his dick. Like the pull of a magnet to metal.

That was why he couldn’t ever do anything about it. Sure, he knew (though no-one ever really talked about it) that guys sometimes went with guys, and if you were the one doing the fucking, then that didn’t mean you weren’t normal. You took a pretty little fairy home once or twice, most guys wouldn’t judge you for it. But the way he wanted guys, the way he wanted Steve, it wasn’t normal at all. It was powerful, like it could be overwhelming if he let it, and maybe he didn’t have any urge to put on a dress like a fairy, but he was as least as far from being a regular guy as they were.

So he tried. He really did. He had more pin-ups and dirty postcards and tijuana bibles than any other kid in the orphanage. And wasn’t like he didn’t like it when he was kissing girls, those soft lips and warm curves.

When he was fifteen he made out with Doris Baker for an hour and by the time she removed his hand from where it had been making its way up her thigh and said she had to go home he was hard, and warm to his toes. He thought then that perhaps he could cure himself, all he needed was some more time around girls. Then he sneaked back into the dorm, and Steve looked up at him from where he was lying drawing on his bed and smiled, and Bucky felt that smile like electricity in his bones.

Perhaps he should have known then that he was a lost cause.

It didn’t stop him trying.

He knew he looked good, learned the smiles and looks that would make the girls blush and giggle. He liked dancing well enough, and knew the girls liked a man who could dance, so put effort into getting better at it. He dressed as sharp as could be done with orphanage clothes, and flirted with any pretty girl who so much as glanced in his direction. He paid attention as well, what worked and what didn’t. Most of the guys he knew, they’d go out looking for dames in a pack. He watched the girls’ reactions, and realized that a pack of guys scared some girls off. So if he was out with a bunch of guys, he’d split if he wanted to talk with a girl.

The other guys punched him in the arm, ribbed him about being a ladies’ man, asked him what his secret was. Bucky always grinned and said something about being too damn handsome for any girl to resist, even as his stomach turned at the idea of his real secret ever getting known.

He thought that if he could get Steve a girl, that would help as well. But - it wasn’t like Steve was completely uninterested, he talked about wanting a girl to look at him like they looked at Bucky, but he never seemed really enthusiastic. Sometimes Steve would come out with the guys, and that was worse, because he’d tell them off for catcalling dames, saying it wasn’t respectful, and they’d round on Steve, mock him for being a “proper li’l gentleman”.

Bucky hated that more than anything. Steve was worth more than a hundred of them. He was a fucking diamond in a place like this, clever and talented and kind, brave and good to the core (and stupid and liable to get himself hurt). But the other jerks he knew, they just wanted to pull that down, get everyone down to their cesspool level where the only thing to look forward to was the next fight or drink or fuck.

Bucky lost his virginity a few months before leaving the orphanage. Her name was Norma, a few years older than him, a girl he’d known since before his mom had died. He hadn’t intended anything to happen, had just seen her looking unhappy in a bar and gone to talk to her. Turned out that she’d let her fiance go all the way with her, had hated every minute of it, and now had serious cold feet about marriage, “an’ I can’t tell any of the girls because they said he was no good. Jeez, Bucky, I’m thinking of joining a nunnery.”

“Seriously? Becoming a penguin can’t be better than faking a headache for the next thirty years.”

She laughed, and he bought her another drink. They were both pretty drunk when they left the bar, and Bucky steered her back to her apartment. When they got there, she pulled him into the shadow of the doorway and kissed him, then said, “Mary’s gone to her aunt’s. Nobody else home. Come upstairs.”

“You spent the whole evening telling me you didn’t like it, and now-”

“And now I gotta convince myself that I ain’t gonna go make myself a penguin.”

Bucky had spent a lot of time researching the territory. He’d hoped that the more detail he could add to his fantasies of women, the less often they’d slide into being guys (and one skinny guy in particular). He’d read books that sternly informed the reader that they should only be seen by medical professionals and married couples. Books that he’d had to spend some time mentally translating, but the way that Norma moaned and moved under his fingers, he thought he’d got the message. And he didn’t even fumble getting the rubber on, didn’t have any false starts getting his dick inside her, so he wasn’t going to go telling her it was his first time.

It was better than his hand, much better, and he tried his best to think of the pretty girl under him, but he couldn’t. Even with his dick inside a girl, he thought of Steve as he came.

Norma curled around him, sighed contently when they were done. He ran his fingers through her hair and kissed her on the forehead. “Not gonna be a penguin then?”

“Nope. I’d say I wished you were the one walking me up the aisle, but you ain’t the marrying type, are ya?” Bucky’s blood ran cold for a moment, mind racing at ways he could have made himself obvious, before she continued, “You’re gonna have a different girl every week ‘til you’re too old to stand up on the dancefloor.”

“You got me, doll.”

He told Steve about it. He almost couldn’t help himself, like he needed to prove that he really did like girls. He didn’t tell him her name, or enough to really identify her. Steve made a face at the fact that she was engaged to another man.

“C’mon Steve, it was her idea.” Bucky grinned. “An’ I did him a favor, ‘cause she’s gonna be a lot more enthusiastic about her wedding night after that.”

Steve quirked half a smile. “You gonna put an ad in the paper then? Bucky Barnes: I’ll make your wife to want to sleep with you.”

Bucky’s grin spread wider. “Hell yeah. How much d’ya think I should charge?”

“If your head gets any bigger it won’t go through the door.”

\---

They had to find somewhere to live, because the orphanage was going to throw them out soon. He’d got some part-time work, and Steve had as well, but money was tight as hell. That all boiled down to one thing - they could afford one room, and one bed.

Bucky had never thought that he was going to miss the narrow orphanage beds that seemed to be half made up of springs that tried to stab you, but this was a whole lot worse. Sure, he’d shared those narrow beds with Steve every winter to keep warm since they were kids, but that had been in a room with ten other boys. The combination of the immediate terror of accidentally betraying himself to all of them, and the dull dread that maybe this would be the winter Steve wouldn’t make it, had always been enough to keep his libido in order. This, this was going to be a room just with them, in the middle of summer when Steve was nearly halfway to being healthy.

The room was small and he just knew it was going to be drafty in winter, but there was just about space for a tiny table and two chairs by the window, and the way the sunlight hit the table made Bucky smile immediately. An artist needed his light.

They owned next to nothing, so moving in took all of fifteen minutes. Bucky wanted to put off getting into that bed with Steve for as long as possible, so he suggested they go out. Steve waved off the suggestion, saying as he finally had a peaceful space to work in he wanted to get some drawings done.

Dancing and dames provided their usual distraction. He danced with a few different girls, then picked his target, a blonde with lipstick just a couple of shades too red to be a good girl, and went in for the kill. Half an hour later they were in an alley, her crouched in front of him with his dick in her mouth. Bucky threaded his fingers through her hair, thrust shallowly into her mouth and failed completely to stop thinking about how her hair color compared to Steve’s.

He wasn’t that drunk when he rolled home (he didn’t have the money for it, not with the deposit on the room), but Steve was a light sleeper and woke up anyway. Steve sat up in bed, and Bucky could see in the light from the streetlamps that he was wrinkling his nose.

“You’re gonna wash before you get in here. You stink of smoke and booze and-” Steve stopped himself suddenly, and Bucky paused.

He didn’t know what made him do it, why he had the sudden urge to push back against the pull that he felt towards Steve. “Say it.”

Steve stared back at him, and Bucky leaned forwards, putting one hand on the bed. “Say it. Smoke and booze _and_.”

Steve glared for a few more seconds before saying very quietly, but with an edge of steel, “You stink of smoke and booze and sex.” Steve licked his lips and swallowed, and shit, Bucky couldn’t help but stare at that. “So you’re gonna go right back down the hallway and wash before you get in this bed.”

He was close enough that he could lean in and kiss him. Press him into the bed and forget all about dames with red lipstick. Unbutton that pajama top and put his hands and lips where he’d always wanted to.

But there was a line of cold fear down his spine, and Bucky stood up, gave a mock salute and headed for the bathroom. He washed up, scrubbed the last traces of red lipstick from his dick, and slunk back to their room and into their bed.

He lay there for a few minutes, before saying, “Does it really bother you?”

“Does what bother me?”

“That I’m out makin’ time with dames.”

“Did she want to do it?”

Bucky couldn’t help but grin. Perhaps he wasn’t all that experienced, but he hadn’t had to ask her twice. “Yeah, she did.”

“Then I guess that’s between you and her. No business of mine to be bothered what you do together.” Steve rolled onto his side and poked Bucky in the shoulder. “It _is_ my business what state you come back to this bed in.”

“Did I just move in with Mother Superior?”

“Watch I don’t spit on a handkerchief and wipe your face.”

Bucky grinned at him. “Ain’t my _face_ that’s the problem.”

Steve groaned and turned over, pulling the sheet over his head as Bucky laughed.

\---

The more you did something, the easier it became. Sharing a bed with Steve was no different. Oh, that pull was there, the bone-deep want that never went away, but the fear of accidentally acting on it lessened.

And everything else was getting better too. He had more hours of work, and Steve did too, which gave them enough money left over to get to art classes. Bucky knew that he was never going to be as good as Steve, but he was good enough, enjoyed it. Art, punching the bags at the gym, dancing and sex were the things that took him out of himself, where he could be perfectly wrapped up in the moment.

They talked about the future too. Neither of them had worked up to any definite plan, but they were going places. Steve wanted to change the world, and though Bucky would never say it out loud, he thought Steve would.

(Deeper under that was the fear, the fear that got worse as the weather got colder, that Steve wouldn’t change the world because he wouldn’t live long enough to do it. The same fear that made him stand between Steve and anyone coughing on the train or in the street, as if he could protect him from the germs that were trying to kill him as much as he tried to protect Steve from the assholes who wanted to beat him up. The fear that he tried to not even think about because it was so terrifying that it made his breath catch in his throat.)

They were sat at the table, both finishing up drawings for class in the last of the afternoon light, vaguely talking about their future.

“We could be a Senator.”

Steve looked at Bucky. “ _We_ could be _a_ Senator.”

“Half of politics is talking the talk, right? And the other half is the brains. That’s what we’ve got. I can talk the talk, and you know how to change the world. So I go out in public and charm everyone, and you write my speeches and get all those policies sorted out. Be chief speechwriter and secretary and-”

“So what you’re saying is that you get the money and the glamour and I get to do all the work.”

“Hey, I’d be the one having to make nice with assholes all day and kiss stinky babies. That sounds like work to me. And if I was paying you, I’d pay you real well.”

“It’s not the _worst_ idea you’ve had.”

“It’s a fantastic idea.”

“Gotta work up to it though. You’re too young for a start. Then we’d need to persuade people that you’re the best candidate for the party, then all the voters-”

“Piece of cake. Just like charming the dames.“

Steve raised an eyebrow. “You gonna give up on the dames when you’re a Senator? Or are you gonna be one of those corrupt-”

“Oh, it’s only corrupt if you’re a hypocrite. So I’m gonna pass legislation so there’s discount rubbers at every corner store, free VD clinics, the most luxurious unmarried mothers’ homes you’ve ever seen-”

Steve burst out laughing. “Vote Bucky Barnes: a New Deal and a pack of rubbers for everyone.”

Bucky couldn’t help but laugh as well. Then he smiled at Steve. “But first I’d make it so anyone with a bad chest could get the medicine and doctors they needed.”

Steve blushed at that, looked out of the window. Bucky felt the heat rising in his own cheeks, looked back at his drawing. He was always skating so close to giving himself away, so close to losing everything.

\---

He nearly gave himself away again a few weeks later, the first time after they left the orphanage that Steve had gotten himself seriously beaten up. He’d met Steve, covered in blood but still walking, on the steps of their block.

“Steve-”

“Not as bad as it looks,” said Steve, indistinctly, “Just a bust lip.”

The way he was holding himself, it was more than that, but he’d save that argument for when they weren’t in public. He followed Steve up the stairs, heading towards the bathroom on their floor. “What happened?”

“Couple of guys hassling a girl. She couldn’t have been more’n thirteen, kept trying to walk away from them. I told them to leave off.”

“And then they hit you.”

“Yeah, but she was able to run off, and that’s what matters.”

They were in the bathroom now, and Bucky shut and locked the door behind them. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath to compose himself. “And you didn’t think that guys who don’t care how old the girl they’re hassling is, might not care if they hit you so hard you don’t get back up again.”

“It was the right thing to do.”

Bucky grabbed Steve a little too roughly, undid his tie, ran the tap in the sink. “Clean yourself up, or god help me I’ll-”

He didn’t know what he’d do. He wanted to shake Steve, wanted to yell in his face that he was an idiot who was going to get himself killed, wanted to hold him and tell him that he didn’t have a damn thing to prove.

He swallowed and said quietly, “I hate it when you do dumb things like this and get yourself hurt.”

Steve looked at him strangely, and shit, what he’d said was too close, too emotional, so he had to cover for it, and kept talking, “‘cause one of these days you’re gonna break something and not be able to work for weeks, and how am I gonna make the rent on my own?”

Steve shook his head and rolled his eyes, then stuck his head under the tap.

\---

The weather drew in, and it got to the time of year when Steve had two states - too damn cold (shivering, with the permanent slight wheeze the cold gave him), and too damn hot (feverish, sometimes coughing up half a lung and sometimes not, always wheezing). Bucky stopped sleeping on his side of the bed, and rolled over to wrap himself around Steve, to try and keep him warm. Steve made a token protest the first time, a protest entirely contradicted by the way he pressed into Bucky.

Bucky would do push-ups before bed, saying that he wanted to keep up better with the guys at the gym. But he thought that Steve knew full well that it was only to warm him up, give some extra body heat to share.

So every night he spooned around Steve, one arm around his chest and the other around his waist, face pressed so close that all he’d have to do to kiss Steve’s neck was turn his head. It was only the fear that kept his body in check. That, and jerking off every morning. He wasn’t even making time with dames - that would keep him out later at night, and leave Steve alone and cold in the bed.

When Steve’s fever ran high, he’d talk, sometimes nonsense, sometimes about things that weren’t there, and sometimes with frightening clarity.

This time, Steve looked at him with fever-bright eyes and said, “I ain’t afraid of dying.”

“I am.”

“You’re not the one who gets sick-”

“I’m afraid of you dying.” Steve was dangerously sick, and Bucky knew it. So Bucky was terrified, terrified enough that little truth slipped out.

Steve blinked at him a couple of times. “Why?”

He wasn’t going to go telling Steve his secrets just because Steve was sick, but there was stuff Steve could know, should know. “‘Cause- ‘cause you make me better. ‘Cause of you I get to art classes, I look for better jobs, hell, I treat dames better. Without you, I’d be just like those assholes you tell off for catcalling every girl in the street.” He wiped Steve’s brow. “I’m a selfish jerk, and I need you around. So just because you ain’t afraid, it doesn’t mean you can go dying on me, Rogers.”

Steve licked his lips, swallowed dryly and said “Bossy.”

Bucky picked up the glass of water by the bed, held it so Steve could drink a little. “Yeah, I am. I’m _ordering_ you to get better.”

That made Steve almost smile.

\---

The weather improved, and Bucky could relax enough to start going out in the evenings again. Sometimes Steve would come with him, more often he wouldn’t. He tried to get Steve to talk to the girls in their art class, maybe ask one of them out.

“I talk to them just fine, Buck.”

“You asked one of them for an eraser once.”

Steve flicked Bucky with a finger. “Asshole. I talk to them more than that, and you know it. But they- they treat me like a pet. Like a stray cat they want to feed. Not like a guy they might date.”

“You don’t know that. You’ve never asked. Ask one of them. Marcie’s the one you like best, ain’t she? So ask her.”

That was always the best way to get Steve to do something - challenge him. He didn’t back down, which some of the time was a serious problem (one set of assholes who’d beaten him up had just wanted to see him down in the gutter, and if Steve had stayed down they’d have stopped, but he just kept getting back up again. That had been years ago, and thinking about what would have happened if he hadn’t turned up when he had still made Bucky’s blood run cold).

So after the next class he saw Steve taking his time clearing up, then walking over to Marcie (who was always last out of class), and Bucky made himself busy being helpful and tidying the room, so he could keep an eye without looking like he was watching. He couldn’t stick close enough to hear what was said without looking suspicious, but he could see the body language. Steve was looking hopeful, but there was that little protective gesture of keeping his sketchpad against his chest. Marcie was smiling, looking pretty as ever, which was a good start. Then Steve was talking, he’d guess stumbling over his words a little and he saw Marcie’s expression change, and shit, she was going to turn Steve down, he could tell before she even opened her mouth, so Bucky started to walk across the room towards them.

That meant he heard her laugh, heard her say, “Aww, Steve, you can’t seriously think I’d go out with you? You’re a sweet guy, but-” she waved at him vaguely, “c’mon, you ain’t even taller than me.”

Steve had already mumbled an apology and left the room just short of running when Bucky got to Marcie, anger bubbling in the pit of his stomach. He stepped in close to her, and she stepped back. “I don’t care that you don’t want to go out with him, and I don’t hit girls. But if you laugh in his face, if you say anything like that to him again, I will make a damn exception.”

“And James.” Shit, he’d been angry enough to forget that their tutor was still there, “if you threaten another of my students, you’ll be out of my class.”

Bucky stepped back, which allowed Marcie to run out of the room. “Sorry ma’am.”

“Come over here and help me move these easels.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You’re very protective of Steven.”

“Ain’t no one else to look out for him.”

“What do you think that he’d think of you threatening to hit a girl?”

Bucky hung his head. “He’d be about as happy about it as you are. But she had no right to-”

“Does that excuse threatening her?”

“No.” Bucky knew that he was mumbling into his collar, and all-round acting like he was seven years old.

She looked at him speculatively. “Good. I wanted to talk to you about something else as well. How’s money for you and Steven?”

Bucky shrugged. “Not much, but we’re paying the bills and we ain’t going hungry.”

“Enough to cover fares to get into Manhattan a few nights a week?”

“Sure. Why?”

“The pair of you are the most talented artists in this class. You’re not in the same league as the rest of these kids. So you should be getting portfolios together to get into classes on your level.”

“You’re serious?”

“Of course I’m serious. I’ll talk to both of you after the next class. Now go find Steven and tell him that. Should cheer him up a little.”

Bucky yelled, “Thanks!” as he ran out of the studio.

It didn’t take him long to catch up with Steve, who was making his way home with his head down. He breathlessly told him the news, watched Steve go from miserable to disbelieving to grinning from ear to ear.

Steve smiling like that was like the sun coming out.

\---

They worked on their art through that spring, and Bucky wasn’t going to kid himself - Steve was the one with the talent and the drive to go with it. Yeah, Bucky was better than average, but you needed to be a helluva lot better than that to make a living as an artist. But he was still going to try and follow Steve for the moment, because it was better than anything on offer in the neighborhood.

He still found time to go out as well, and hit on the idea of double dates. If he was going to be honest, he was kicking himself that he hadn’t thought of it earlier. Girls almost always had a single friend somewhere, and it meant that Steve didn’t have to ask. All round perfect.

Except for the fact that after doing that for six months, none of the girls had wanted to see Steve for a second date. Not one.

Bucky was sure that was life laughing at him. There he was, wanting Steve so badly it would drive him crazy if he let it and he couldn’t convince a dame to even kiss Steve. And he knew that got Steve down, however much he tried to put a brave face on it.

But apart from cursing the universe, Bucky didn’t have any idea what to do about any of that. So they kept on as they were, which usually meant Steve going home early, and Bucky spending his evening dancing, drinking or in bed with his date.

Tonight he couldn’t remember her name. Ruthie? Amy? It ended with that sort of sound, but he couldn’t remember the beginning. He could remember which numbers she’d liked to dance to, what she drank, and that her roommates weren’t going to be back for a while, which seemed like the important stuff. He could get by with ‘doll’ and ‘darlin’ for names.

Her dress was on the floor, along with his shirt and pants, and he was making short work of her underwear as they kissed. He paused to lean off the bed and retrieve a rubber from his pocket, and as he ripped the packet she said, “You can use that if you want, but you ain’t goin’ in the front door.”

“What?”

“Them things don’t work every time, and I ain’t getting knocked up for anyone. So the other way.” She looked at him for a moment. “You ain’t done it that way, have you?” Bucky was about to open his mouth to lie, when she said. “Don’t matter. You’re gonna learn.” She opened the nightstand and brought out a jar of vaseline. Bucky rolled on the rubber anyway. Didn’t do any harm to try and stop catching anything.

“Don’t it hurt?”

“Not if you practice. Work yourself up on your own fingers first so you know you can take it. Clean yourself up beforehand. And,” she waved the vaseline, “You gotta have something slippery.”

She slicked his fingers with the vaseline and guided them inside her. It was much tighter than a cooch, but the way she moved against him said she was enjoying herself. Then she smeared vaseline across his dick and turned over, looking over her shoulder and giving him a ‘come on’ look.

It was almost too much, because he knew he could do this with a guy, fuck, could do this with Steve. She wasn’t the right shape to properly think she was a guy, too many curves even with her face down. He gripped her hips as he fucked into her, thought of other hips under his hands, and came hard and too fast.

He went down on her by way of apology, and then cleared out of there as fast as was polite. He needed to clear his head before going home. Clear his head of any thoughts of fucking Steve through the mattress.

Or… (and this thought had his pulse speeding up, had him chewing the inside of his own lip)... or Steve doing that to him. Steve being the big guy for once, bossing him around, turning Bucky over in bed and spreading his legs-

He tried to cut that thought off. He was going to have to go home and sleep in the same bed as the guy. He spent an hour or so walking around and thinking of every non-sexual thing he could think of before heading home. And he didn’t go straight to their room, but instead to the shared bathroom for a wash in the cold water.

He slipped into their room, already half-undressed.

Steve was in bed, and muzzily said, “You have a good night with Betty?”

“ _Betty_. Been spending half the evening trying to remember her name.”

Steve sighed. “You don’t even remember their names anymore.”

“Yeah yeah, I’m a bad guy and you’re my conscience, that’s why you can remember and I can’t.”

“You’re not a bad guy. Never seen you go after a girl that didn’t want you.” He saw Steve’s rueful smile. “I don’t think she cared if you remembered her name.”

Bucky wanted nothing more than to scoop Steve into his arms, kiss him and say a hundred stupid things that would probably make a cheap romance writer feel like throwing up. Instead he slid into bed, said, “I’ll find you a girl. That’s a promise.” Steve sighed doubtfully, and so Bucky said, “If you wanted to know what it’s like, being with a girl, I’d pay for you. My treat. Make up for my lousy choices in double dates-”

“No.” That was very firm. “I want it to mean something.”

Of course Steve would. “Sure. I’ll look harder, ok?”

\---

Then fall rolled around, and they were taking the subway to a proper art class, uptown, something that if they worked at it might end up with a college degree. Subsidised class as well, so all they had to afford was their fares and their materials (which was enough, on the amount they earned, but they could manage).

Very suddenly, Bucky was no longer a bigshot. Sure, the girls still looked at him, and he could turn on the charm as well as he always could. But sharp dressing for Brooklyn was not the same as sharp dressing for Manhattan, and he knew it and they knew it. Oh, no one was an asshole, or tried to make them feel like they shouldn’t be there, but almost all the rest of the class were there as extra work from full-time art courses, and almost none of them were being subsidised. Hell, in the first class there were already a couple talking about their own studios.

It didn’t make him want to leave. It made him want to succeed, show them that a couple of poor kids from Brooklyn could be good, better than they were. So he worked, paid attention in the theory class, went with Steve to the library for extra study, and was more of a dutiful student than he’d ever been in his entire life.

That, combined with work, didn’t leave him with much time or energy to go out, so no more double dates for the moment. Though he thought that some of the girls in class might be a good bet for future. They were clever, independent, and he hoped they might be bright enough to see the diamond that Steve was.

Though his more immediate problem wasn’t the girls in the class, it was one of the guys, Ralph, who had definitely been casting looks his way. It terrified Bucky, because he had no idea if the guy was just flirting randomly, or if he _knew_ , if he could read Bucky’s dirty little secret, if he could go ahead and tell Steve his best friend was a filthy queer. Which was stupid, because even if Ralph straight up said that to Steve, Bucky had never done anything, and all he had to do was deny it and Steve would believe him over some guy he barely knew.

The other thing that terrified Bucky was that Ralph was cute. He let it happen and they could be walking out of class together, and he could have what he was desperate for, and desperately denying himself.

Then Bucky was staying behind to help Steve put away his canvas, an awkward-shaped thing for a cityscape, and he became aware that while everyone else had left, Ralph was lingering. His hackles rose, mainly in fear, because this might be the time he gave himself away.

Steve was putting the last of his things into his knapsack as Ralph walked over. “God help me, but I have had it with subtlety. Do you want to or don’t you, Bucky?”

“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, just maybe the fact that you’ve been flirting with me over the top of your canvas for the past two weeks, then running a mile whenever I get close enough to have an actual conversation.” Ralph looked him appraisingly up and down, and Bucky did want to run a mile, wanted to kiss the bastard, wanted to throw up. “So what is it then?”

Bucky had taken two steps towards him, anger bubbling all the more fiercely for every word of that having been true, fists clenched. “Listen, you goddamned little queer, get your ass out of here before I bust your face so hard-”

“Bucky.” Steve’s voice was all steel. “Back off.”

Ralph smiled. “All I wanted was a clear answer, darling. No need to go and prove just how masculine you are by getting blood everywhere.” He was halfway to the door before he said, “After all, after that neither of us are in _any_ doubt about where your preferences lie.”

Bucky wanted to run after him, punch the smug smile off his face, hit him because he couldn’t be allowed to go and think that. But he knew that Steve was still watching him, and stayed put, fingernails digging into his palms.

“I ain’t having a filthy little queer talk to me like that.”

Steve said quietly, “People can’t help how they’re made. Even if he was flirting with you, he didn’t deserve to be spoken to like that, and he doesn’t deserve to get hit.”

“It’s illegal, immoral and I don’t have to like it.”

“Last I checked screwing around with girls you weren’t married to was immoral as well. And I’m not asking you to like it, I’m asking you to be polite.”

“Fine. I’ll be polite to fairies. Satisfied?”

Steve didn’t even look at him as he picked his knapsack up. The silence continued all the way home and through the next day, and not just silence, Steve wouldn’t even make eye contact with him. He thought that maybe this had been the longest he’d gone without talking to Steve since they’d met.

Steve could say a helluva lot without saying anything. Disapproval, disappointment, all written in the silence.

Eventually, that evening, Bucky said, “So, am I supposed to make nice with everyone now, whatever they are?”

“Not everyone. If- if what someone’s doing isn’t hurting anyone, then yeah, you do. Doesn’t mean you have to start being nice to bullies and assholes. But- but what people are doing in bed isn’t any business of anyone else’s if no one’s getting hurt, if that’s what they want.” Steve looked out of the window. “You- you can turn someone down without being cruel.”

That was when Bucky realised it. Steve had been at the receiving end of all those uninterested girls, and most of them had let him down gently, but some of them- hell, Bucky still kinda wanted to slap Marcie for laughing in Steve’s face.

“I’m sorry. Jeez, I really am. I just- it ain’t something I’m used to, ok? I don’t want that kind of trouble.”

“Guess you’ve finally found the downside to everyone wanting to kiss you.”

\---

Needing to get the right signals out there was enough of a push for him to set up another double date. Sylvia and Vivian were studious, best friends, fairly pretty, and Vivian was petite enough that she’d be looking up to Steve. A little over-serious for his taste, perhaps; in theory classes they asked questions that betrayed a lot of extra reading, and they left leaflets for various political meetings at the desks in class. But Bucky wasn’t stupid, and though he didn’t broadcast it, he did follow the news, so he thought he could keep up with them.

Sylvia fixed him with a steely look. “A date.”

“Double date. So I’m asking you out, and Steve’s asking Vivian out.” He caught Vivian and Steve smiling at each other in a slightly nervous way. That was good.

She held his gaze for a few moments, as Bucky gave his most winning smile. Then she looked at Vivian, and back at him. “Yes.”

“Great. Coffee bar on the corner on Saturday?” He wasn’t going to start with drinking and dancing with these two. Coffee and conversation seemed a much better idea. He also knew that he was not getting laid after this date. He suspected there would be a written paper on political theory to pass before he could get in Sylvia’s panties, though if he was entirely honest, the idea of screwing her was a little intimidating. She’d probably give him a grade card afterwards.

They talked about Nazis, the war in Spain, and it was altogether the least date-like date he’d been on in his life. But Steve seemed more comfortable, that there was something he could talk about (not that either of them were getting many words in edgewise while Sylvia was holding forth). Steve seemed to be getting a little closer to Vivian, some glances being exchanged, some smiles, and yeah, this had been a great idea.

And then everything went to hell as Sylvia said, “It’s a pity we can’t be more like the Soviet Union. When we finally have the revolution-”

Steve shot back, “You’re not seriously suggesting revolution. This country is great because it’s a democracy-”

“Democracy has failed. The government may promise a New Deal, but it’s distraction, a sop to the proletariat to stop them revolting, so that the underlying bourgeoisie oligarchy can remain.”

“No, this is a government of the people for the people, that’s the whole point-”

“I had thought that you were clever enough not to be taken in by the propaganda, but I see I was wrong. I’m going home. Vivian?”

Vivian looked sadly at Steve. “You seem like a nice guy, but I can’t go dating an enemy of the workers.” She sighed. “If you ever get past the false consciousness, then perhaps…” She followed Sylvia out of the door.

There was a moment’s silence before Bucky looked at Steve, and they both burst out laughing.

Bucky composed himself and said, “We just got politically dumped.”

“Do you think I can use this to persuade Mr. Anderson downstairs that we’re not communists?”

“Nah, ‘cause anything less than full blackshirts is communism to him, and we’re _Democrats_.”

Steve smiled. “But we’re enemies of the people, Buck.”

“Gonna have to work on our ideology for the dames in future, comrade.”

\---

As the weeks drew on, they actually started to properly get to know the people in their class. He didn’t quite get as far as apologising to Ralph, but he had a couple of civil conversations with the guy, which seemed to please Steve. The story of their disastrous date with Sylvia and Vivian got told and retold, until it involved Sylvia putting them on a list of repressive persons and giving that list to a shady Russian in a black car.

“You were very nearly trophy proletariat,” said Annie, leaning around the side of her canvas to talk to them.

“What?” said Bucky.

“Only reason they agreed to go on a date with you,” said Martin, nodding to the other side of the room, where Sylvia and Vivian were arguing again about their latest ‘triumph of the workers’ painting. Communist collective artwork looked to consist of three-fourths fighting to one-fourth working.

Annie grinned, “Genuine working class boys they could take along to their meetings like show dogs.”

“Figures,” said Steve. Bucky could hear the note of defeat, and wanted to say something, try and cheer Steve up, but couldn’t work out the words, especially in company.

“I don’t know it was the _only_ reason they went on the date,” said Ralph, standing on tiptoe to peer over his canvas, “The roguish charm and movie-star looks must have helped.”

“Don’t even-” started Bucky.

“Please tell me you have money riding on him punching you, because otherwise you’re the biggest idiot I’ve ever met, Ralph,” said Martin.

Ruby walked back to their corner, carrying clean jars of water, “If Ralph’s going to get punched, can I get my camera first? There’s a great action shot in there, I’m sure. Better if they both stripped to the waist. If I get a few rapid shots off, you’d be able to see the muscular movement dynamics-”

“I think,” said Annie, smirking, “that the whole point of the potential fight was that Bucky didn’t want to be involved in shirtless wrestling with Ralph.”

Ruby threw a dramatic pose, “But what about _Art_?”

Bucky became aware that Steve was suppressing a snicker. “Steve, you’re supposed to be on my side.”

“I am! Just seems there’s only about three people here that want you to keep your shirt _on_.”

“You should honor the democratic ideals of this great country by taking your top off, Bucky.” said Ruby, very seriously.

“I hate all of you.” said Bucky.

\---

It was February before Steve got really sick again. The idiot tried to hide it from him, and though Bucky could see he was sick, he hadn’t realised how sick. So they’d headed out to class, through the snow, Steve’s steps getting slower and slower as they went, but denying that anything was wrong. It was only when they got to the studio, and Steve unwrapped himself from his hat and scarf that Bucky saw how bad he looked, ashen pale, pink across his cheeks, eyes too bright. Bucky put a hand on his forehead without thinking, and though Steve flinched away, he’d felt how hot he was.

“Jeez, Steve, you’re burning up, I need to get you back home.”

“I’m fine. Just let me work.”

“Steve-”

“Bucky.”

There was no talking to Steve when he was like this, so Bucky said, “You just tell me if you wanna leave early, ok?”

Steve made it through the whole class, just barely. Bucky helped him clear up, get their things together, which seemed to take twice as long as it usually did. Steve was swaying as he put his coat on.

“You’re a stubborn asshole.”

“I’m fine.” Steve then took two steps and would have collapsed if Bucky hadn’t caught him. Bucky barely noticed Ralph coming back into the room, picking up a forgotten box of pencils, and then pausing.

Bucky hooked an arm under Steve’s arms and headed for the door.

“Is he ok?” said Ralph, looking concerned.

“He’s sick, but he’ll be fine. Just gotta get him home.”

“Home’s Brooklyn, isn’t it? Have you looked outside?”

Bucky hadn’t, because the studio had high windows and rooflights to give maximum light while allowing work to be displayed on the walls. Now he looked up, and saw there was a blizzard outside.

“Aw, hell.”

“Come back to mine.” Ralph put his hands up. “Nothing sleazy, I’m sure you could knock me out with one punch if you wanted, it’s just it’s only round the corner, and my sister was coming down so the guest room’s made up, but she decided not to because of the snow.”

“I’ll make it home fine.”

“You might make it home dead, you idiot.” He smiled helplessly at Ralph. “Thanks.”

They followed Ralph down the stairs, Bucky still supporting Steve. As soon as the cold air and snow hit him, Steve folded some more, and Ralph took the other side, and between them they mostly carried him down the block. Bucky didn’t even look at the building they went into, concentrating on Steve.

He did register that it not only had an elevator, but an elevator operator too. Bucky had a vague thought that Ralph would bring all his conquests home this way, and would the elevator guy think that they were- but that was dumb. It was obvious that Steve was too sick for anything like that.

Ralph’s apartment was large, and beautifully warm. He steered them towards a bedroom bigger than the room Bucky shared with Steve, and the pair of them pushed Steve to sit on the bed.

“I’ll go and find some spare pajamas, though they might be a little large.”

“I can’t, got no way to repay you.” Steve was almost slurring, shit, that was such a bad sign.

“You can repay me by not dying, Steve, because you’re too damned talented to go dying because you went out in a snowstorm. Deal?”

Ralph left the room without waiting for an answer. Bucky helped Steve out of his coat and shoes, sticking them by the radiator to dry.

Ralph came back and laid the pajamas on the bed. “I’m going to call a doctor-”

“Hey, no,” said Bucky, “We can’t afford a doctor and I ain’t owing you-”

“It’s perfectly selfish. If you go and die in my guestroom, sis will never stay again, and I rather enjoy her visits.”

He’d disappeared before Bucky could come up with an answer to that.

Bucky settled for helping Steve out of his clothes and into the pajamas. “If you weren’t such a stubborn idiot, we’d still be at home, and I wouldn’t have to go owing anyone anything.”

“Sorry, Buck. Thought I was getting better.”

Bucky sighed. “Yeah, and I should know you’re an idiot and should have checked you over before we left.”

He tucked Steve into bed, and Steve was dozing in a couple of moments. He perched on the edge of the bed and watched him breathe. He didn’t know how long it was before he heard a soft knock on the door.

“Come in.”

Ralph came in with another man. “This is Dr. Anderson.”

Bucky stepped back, watched as the doctor woke Steve up, asked him questions, examined him.

“Were you aware of any pre-existing medical conditions?”

Steve said, “Just a bad chest.”

“Have you lived with anyone who suffered from tuberculosis?”

“Mom died of TB when I was six.”

“Have you ever been told you have heart problems?”

“No.”

“Rheumatic fever?”

“No-” said Steve.

“Yeah. One time he was sick, I overheard the nurse say it was rheumatic fever, but they never said that to Steve.”

“The current problem is pneumonia, for which we can do little other than aspirin, rest, warmth and good nutrition. I have done all I can for the moment. I am sure Mr. Johnson will call me if I am needed.”

Steve had collapsed back into the pillows again, exhausted just from being examined. He was dozing as Bucky pulled the covers up to his chin.

The doctor was waiting in the doorway, and indicated that he wanted Bucky to follow him. He did, and the doctor shut the bedroom door behind him. The doctor led him to the dining room, and they both sat down.

“Does he have any family? Any next of kin?”

Bucky shook his head. “I’ve known him since we were kids in the orphanage, so I guess I’m as close to next of kin as he’s got.”

“You are aware that he is dangerously ill.”

Bucky looked down at the table. “Yeah. He does this every winter. Never know if he’s gonna make it.”

“But neither of you seem to be aware of his underlying conditions. It is highly likely that he is asthmatic. He has defects of his heart valves, likely from rheumatic fever, and an irregular heartbeat. Any one of these could be fatal.”

“Is there anything we can do?”

“For the heart, avoid putting it under strain; avoid physical or emotional stressors as far as possible. For the asthma, there is a strong emotional component, and it will worsen with poor mood. Also avoid anything that may irritate the airways, smoke especially.”

“What about asthma cigarettes-”

“Based on outdated theories, and should be avoided. I cannot emphasise enough the care your friend needs to take with his health. My prescription would be for an extended stay at a convalescent home outside the city, where there is better air, but I understand that is unlikely to be an option for you.”

“Not unless someone else is gonna pay for it.”

“If he recovers, he will also need an X-ray to ensure he does not have tuberculosis. The voluntary hospital will provide one free of charge for suspected cases.”

“TB?” On top of everything else, that was like a knife in Bucky’s heart. Some people got better, but most, it was that downward slide, eating away at you.

“He does not have classic symptoms, but in light of his persistent lung problems it is wise to be certain. If he does have tuberculosis, he may be sent to one of the state homes without charge. If he does not, then you will simply have to do the best with what you have. The best ventilation possible, avoidance of smoke where possible and so on. Do you understand?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“Very well. I will detail my diagnoses and recommendations in a letter to you. I suggest that you only share this information with Mr. Rogers if his physical and emotional state will not be compromised by it.”

He saw the doctor to the door, then went back to check on Steve, who was still dozing, breathing fast and difficult.

Ralph was hovering in the doorway. “Er... cocoa? Coffee? Brandy?”

“Don’t know.” Bucky scrubbed a hand over his face. Ralph steered him out of the room, sat him on the couch in the lounge, disappeared and came back after a few minutes with a pot of coffee. He put a generous slug of brandy in Bucky’s cup. Neither of them spoke for a while, just drank their coffee.

“You look shell shocked.”

“I- I knew he got sick a lot, Jesus, he does this every winter, but just a bad chest, right? Not..” He couldn’t actually say it, the specter of TB was too horrendous. Bucky had to close his eyes to get some control. “Fuck.”

“Every winter. And he gets through. So he’s tough.”

“Yeah. Tough as nails. He don’t look it, but he takes on any bully who’s hassling someone, guys twice his size.”

Ralph sighed. “If I mention some home truths, will you hit me?”

Bucky looked down. “Ain’t supposed to hit someone for telling the truth.”

“You know you’re in love with him.”

Bucky stared into his coffee, feeling his chest tighten.

“I’ll take that as a yes. Ever occur to you that it might not be one-sided?”

“No. He’s good, he’s gonna change the world. Don’t need nothing that makes him look bad. Don’t need anyone dragging him down.”

“I’d have thought that was his choice.”

“I gotta look after him, and that ain’t part of it.”

Ralph shrugged. “All rather academic. Right now we need to get him better.”

“We? When did this become we?”

“I did mention about him not dying in my guestroom didn’t I?”

Bucky did the same as he did every time that Steve was sick, dozed fitfully on the bed next to him, waking every time Steve so much as shuffled in the bed. It was in the early hours of the morning that he thought the crisis was coming, and stayed awake, wiping Steve’s face, praying silently, talking to Steve if there was any sign that he might be alert enough to hear.

“You left the door open.” Steve had opened his eyes and was looking right at Bucky.

“Huh?”

“When you were talking to Ralph. You didn’t shut the door. I heard.”

Bucky’s heart was hammering in his chest, and it looked for a moment like Steve was going to doze off again, but he rallied again and said, “I love you. Thought you liked girls. Thought you wanted to punch queers.”

Steve lolled against the pillows, and for a sick few seconds Bucky thought that was it, Steve was going to die right there and then. But he licked his lips and opened his eyes, looked back at Bucky.

Bucky drew Steve into his arms, even though Steve was frighteningly hot and drenched with sweat, held him so close their foreheads touched. “I love you so much it fucking terrifies me. I want you so bad I’d do anything to stop thinking about it.” Without thinking he pressed a closed-mouth kiss to Steve’s lips.

Steve smiled, and his eyes drifted shut.

Having gotten hold of him, Bucky couldn’t seem to make himself let go again, even though he was in some other guy’s bed, even though Steve was hot and sticky and frankly unpleasant to keep hold of. But Steve cooled in the night, got less restless, and by the time there was a soft knock on the door to wake him, Bucky was back sleeping on his own side of the bed.

“Err- breakfast? And it’s seven am, do you need to be anywhere today?”

Shit. Work. Calling sick was always risking losing the job, and so while Steve wasn’t going anywhere, he had to get to work.

“Yeah, gotta go to work. Uh, damn, could you look after Steve?”

“Hey,” Steve was trying to sit up in bed, “I can look after myself, I’ll get home-”

“You will not.” Bucky and Ralph said that perfectly in time.

“I’m sure most people will be using the weather to skip classes anyway, not a problem. Are you supposed to have a tin box with your lunch in it or something?”

“You ain’t got a clue, have you?”

“No, but I’m doing my best. Do you want a sandwich?”

“If you’re offering.”

The water in the shower was deliciously hot, and he accepted a large but dubious sandwich to take with him, and trudged through the snow to work. It was all enough to take his mind off the fact that last night, he’d kissed Steve.

He headed back to Ralph’s that evening, and realised when he got there that he had no idea of the apartment number, but there was a smiling concierge who told him that Mr Johnson was expecting him, gave the floor and apartment number.

Steve was still in bed, but now sat propped up on the biggest pile of pillows Bucky had ever seen in his life, asleep with a book open in his lap.

“Dr. Anderson came round this afternoon, and he seemed genuinely surprised at how much better Steve was looking.”

Bucky grinned, “Told you he was a tough little bastard.”

“He’s also not deaf,” said Steve, opening his eyes. “We should be getting home-”

Ralph smiled at Bucky, “Still needs help to walk as far as the bathroom, so I’d suggest he stays another night at least.”

“You sure?” said Bucky, ignoring the protest that Steve had already started.

“Absolutely. No one else needs the bed, and he’s good company when he’s awake. Cook has already started to make supper for three, though I should warn you that having told her that you’ve been out working in this weather, you may be presented with more dumplings than it is possible for a human being to eat.”

Bucky enthusiastically proved him wrong, and wrong again about the amount of cake and custard it was possible for a person to eat. Steve didn’t eat much, but he did eat some, and that was enough to show that he’d turned the corner and really was going to get better.

When he slipped into bed with Steve that night, Steve gave no indication that he remembered anything from the previous night, and Bucky wasn’t going to bring it up if he didn’t. He might not have meant it. Fevers did strange things to your mind.

“No need to look so worried, Buck. I’m doing ok.”

Bucky sighed. “That ain’t what the doctor said. Said it’s not just the pneumonia, you’ve got a bunch of other things wrong with you. Asthma, something wrong with your heart too. And-” Bucky swallowed, “he wants you to have an X-Ray, ‘case you’ve got TB.”

Steve looked away from him, “Oh.”

Bucky found Steve’s hand and squeezed it. Steve hadn’t just seen his mom die of TB, they’d both seen other people taken by the disease. “Sorry. He said I shouldn’t let you do too much or get worked up about anything-”

“No.”

“What?”

“I’m not being an invalid, wrapped up in a blanket and avoiding the world. That’s not living, that’s just marking time until you die.”

Bucky squeezed his hand again, “And that’s why I said you were tough.”

He kept to his own side of the bed, as the apartment was heated well enough that Steve didn’t need the extra warmth, and went to work the next day with another dubious sandwich. When he came back that evening, he found Steve on the couch, wrapped in a huge quilt, drawing.

“Since you were both so adamant about not oweing me, I’ve got two drawings off Steve, one for me, one for sis, so when he inevitably becomes famous they will be incredibly valuable. Early period naiveté. And while he can now walk without help, I think he still sounds terrible, but he claims that’s normal.”

Steve took a theatrical deep breath in and out, which definitely still rattled. “I’m fine, we can go home.”

“Yeah, he sounds that crummy most winter. He’s good.”

“Well, supper is being made for three again, you should stay for that. But after that I shall tell you where I have hidden your clothes, so you can change out of the pajamas and go home.”

“Huh. Never thought of that as a way of making him stay indoors.”

Steve groaned. “Oh, no, Bucky, c’mon…”

They didn’t talk much on the way home, but when they got to their room (so much colder and draftier than where they’d come from), hung up their coats, Steve turned to him and said, very quietly, “I remember what I said in the night. And I remember you kissed me.”

Bucky sat on the edge of the bed, looked at his knees. “I- this is a bad idea. I’ll find you a girl, you don’t have to make do-”

“It’s not making do if I want it more.”

“Church and cops have got a lot to say about that being wrong.”

“I think- I think they’re both wrong. You- you used to say I was too good because I spent my time in Sunday school reading the bible. I was- I was looking for what it said about people like me. And there’s things in the Old Testament, but Jesus doesn’t say a thing about it. Not a thing, Bucky. Letting he who is without sin cast the first stone is in there, but nothing about guys who love guys.” Steve looked at him with absolute conviction. “I meant it when I said people can’t help how they’re made, and if it doesn’t hurt anyone, then it’s no business of anyone else’s.”

Bucky’s voice cracked as he said, “You drive me crazy. If I start, I won’t be able to stop-”

Steve bent down and kissed him, still slightly too warm to the touch, and Bucky parted his lips to him immediately. He pulled Steve close, then without breaking the kiss, leant back on the bed, pulling Steve with him.

It was sloppy, over-enthusiastic, and fuck, he was the first person Steve had kissed, wasn’t he? But it was fucking perfect, better than any other kiss, because this was Steve, this was what he’d wanted for so long. He felt like there was fire and electricity and sparks under his skin just from kissing, just from the weight of Steve laid on top of him. He slid his hands under Steve’s sweater, started pulling up his shirt and undershirt until he could get his hands on Steve’s skin. Still a little too warm, a little clammy, but yes, this was what he’d been waiting for. He circled his hands around Steve’s waist (too small, he always got thinner in winter), and then he was undoing Steve’s belt, unbuttoning his fly, sliding a hand inside.

He’d seen Steve in all states of undress, and knew he was at least average sized down there, had imagined touching him like this so many times, but fantasy was never as good as reality. Steve was hard before he touched him, so hard that there was already dampness at the head of his dick. Bucky wrapped his hand around the silk-hardness of it, as Steve made a choked noise and pulled back from the kiss, having trouble catching his breath.

Bucky moved his hand back on to Steve’s stomach. “It’s ok, just breathe-”

Steve had the same look he always did when he was irritated at himself. “I want-”

Bucky chuckled softly. “Yeah, I got that.” He sat the both of them up, then quickly undressed. Steve did the same, and Bucky pulled back the covers of the bed and slid underneath, Steve following. He really wanted to look, properly look at Steve, not the sidelong glances he’d always had before, but it was too damn cold for Steve to be going around naked. He pulled Steve on top of him, then pulled the covers up high around them both. Steve was bracing himself on his arms, hovering uncertainly, so Bucky put a hand around his neck and pulled him in for another kiss, and as he did so pulled Steve’s body flush against his own.

He bit back on the noise he wanted to make, because if he thought he’d been feeling fire and electricity before, that was nothing to what he was feeling pressed against Steve naked and hard, tip of his dick wet against his stomach. He drew back from the kiss, looked at Steve and said, “Breathe, Steve.” as he wrapped his hand around Steve’s dick again.

He knew what felt good on himself, what he liked girls doing to him, hoped it was the same for Steve. It didn’t take long before Steve was pressing his face into Bucky’s shoulder and coming, hot over Bucky’s chest and stomach.

Bucky was so hard he was aching, but bit his lip to try and think of something else, wanting to give Steve at least a little time to get his breathing back in order. Steve was a dead weight across his chest, breathing fast and wheezy, but Bucky felt Steve’s long fingers curl around his dick, gently stroke up and down its length.

He turned his head to whisper in Steve’s ear, “Don’t be a fucking tease.”

“Language.” But Steve gripped harder, worked his thumb around the head, and that, after everything, was enough. Fuck, he’d come harder from Steve’s hand than he’d ever done with a girl.

He was lying there, warm and content, arms wrapped around Steve, when they heard the sounds of another argument starting up between the Lorenzos next door. Steve stiffened in his arms and whispered, “What if anyone heard?”

That sliced a jolt of fear through him, but they had been quiet, hadn’t made any suspicious noises. “Nothing to hear. We were quiet, didn’t make the bed creak. Just gotta stay quiet.” He sighed. “And I told you this was a bad idea.”

“I know. But I- It’s always been you. Can’t even look at a girl without thinking of you. Used to think I’d grow out of it, but… no. This- this is who I am.”

Bucky kissed him. “Screwing half of Brooklyn didn’t help. I love you. So much.” His breath caught, the emotion under the words almost too much. “But… but...I wish- I wish I didn’t want this. Just want to be a regular guy.”

“Sorry.”

“Why’re you sorry? You ain’t all that, Steve, pretty sure I could resist you if I was a regular guy.”

That made Steve smile. “Not sure anyone can resist you, Buck.”

“So this is all my fault.”

Steve was grinning now. “Definitely.”

“Well, lucky for you then that Mr. Irresistible is letting you in his bed.”

“It’s half my bed.”

“You’re lying in my half.”

They slept like they usually did, Bucky spooned around Steve, except that in the morning when he woke up Bucky pushed down Steve’s pajama pants, wrapped a hand around him and jerked him off, sliding his own dick between Steve’s legs, all the time trying to keep his movements small enough to not make the bed creak. Steve pressed his legs together as he came, which was enough for Bucky to follow him.

\---

It didn’t change anything. It _couldn’t_ change anything. There couldn’t be any hints, anything that could raise any suspicion. He wasn’t sure if Steve was going to be a great artist or a politician or what, but he was going to make something of himself, and he couldn’t do that if he got arrested for… this. However much he wanted to have his hands on Steve almost all the time, with a frightening desperation that took his breath away, he had to fight it.

He was most worried about the people in art class - artists were supposed to observe, to notice things. If anyone was going to pick up that something had changed between them, it was them. So he was glad that classes were cancelled for a few days because of the weather; it let him practice keeping the stupid smile from his face, practice looking like nothing was different.

Annie grinned at the two of them as they set up their easels at the next class. “Ralph has been loudly moping that he had the cutest boy in the whole class sleeping in his apartment for two nights, and he didn’t even see you with your shirt off.”

Bucky had a jolt at that; he’d been so wrapped up with the idea that no-one would get the wrong idea about him and Steve, that it hadn’t occurred to him that anyone might get the wrong idea about him and Ralph. But he realized it was actually a good cover - Ralph was cute and queer and definitely interested, so if he was moping, then it made Bucky look… normal.

Bucky shrugged, “Beats dragging him home half-dead through the snow.”

Steve shot him a dirty look, “I’d have made it.”

Martin and Ruby had walked in half-way through this conversation, and Martin said “The way Ralph tells it, the doctor came for his second visit with the death certificate all filled in, just missing time of death.”

“I’m fine, ok? Ralph makes everything dramatic.”

Well, yeah, he did, but Steve _had_ been at death’s door. But Steve never wanted to seem weak, so Bucky said, “There’s a long way between not being able to get to Brooklyn through a blizzard and dead.”

That was the point Ralph came in, saying, “Sis loves her drawing. Says you should stay over more often if that means more drawings for her.” He sniffed. “She followed that up with some rather disparaging comments about my art, so you should take her artistic judgement with a pinch of salt.”

Bucky watched Ralph for any sign that he’d noticed a change between him and Steve, or any sign that Ralph might have talked to anyone about Bucky’s not-quite-confession. But there was nothing.

He had to remember that just because his world had been tipped upside down (in the most wonderful, terrifying way), it didn’t mean that anyone else’s world had changed. They were all just going on as normal - and all that he and Steve had to do was not intrude onto that normality.

It should have been easy, but the gut-deep _want_ that pulled him towards Steve was so strong that it made it a genuine effort. Want that made him press Steve against their door to kiss him senseless before he’d even taken his coat off, want that had him on his knees and sucking Steve’s dick, and enjoying sucking cock so much that he came with his own hand around his dick as Steve came in his mouth. Want that made him buy a jar of vaseline at the furthest druggist from home he passed, that made him have the awkward conversation with Steve about fucking.

Steve was a damn fast learner though. The first time that Steve sucked him off was the first time that Steve slid a slicked finger inside him, pressed something inside that Bucky didn’t even have a name for, and Bucky came so hard he thought he was going to bite through his tongue in the effort not to make a noise. And Steve was the one who thought of pulling the covers off the bed so they could move together on the floor without worrying about the bed creaking.

It was Steve who kept him in line. Steve seemed to be as crazy about this as he was, behind closed doors at least; but Steve was clever, a planner, and knew what had to be done to keep them safe.

“You… everyone knows you’re a ladies man, Buck.”

“Everyone’s wrong.” He kissed Steve at his jawline, fingers sliding into Steve’s hair.

Steve leaned away, took Bucky’s hand and said, “And they can’t know they’re wrong.”

“You mean-”

“How many weekends do you think you can miss being seen out in the dancehalls? You always miss a few for work and assignments, but you haven’t been out in weeks. The boys are going to start asking questions.”

“I don’t want-”

Steve kissed him, intense and deep. “I want you to stay here as well. I want…” Steve swallowed, lowered his eyes, then looked back at Bucky. “But tonight you’re gonna go out, and you’re gonna flirt with half the girls in the dancehall, and dance with at least three of them, and everyone is gonna _see_ you do that.”

It shouldn’t have been difficult. After all, it was what he’d been doing for years, pretending to want one thing when he actually wanted another. But it was much, much harder to concentrate, much harder to pretend. The first two girls he danced with asked him what was on his mind, and it was an effort to keep himself focused on the person he was with. He only really managed it by throwing himself into the music, thinking about the dance more than his partner.

He pretended to drink more than he actually did, pretended to be drunker than he was, staggered out with a bunch of guys he knew, and faked drunk all the way home.

Steve was curled in bed, reading, all the blankets and coats on the bed, and that sight was better than any booze, any dancing, _anything_.

The neighbors would have been expecting drunken loudness, so that’s what they got.

“Hey Stevie, you shoulda come out-”

“Shush, Buck, people are trying to sleep.” But Steve was grinning, knew that Bucky was sober.

Bucky was undressing, and said in the loud-whisper of the properly drunk, “I am quiet. You shoulda come Stevie, come out dancing-

Bucky had stripped to his underwear, and knelt on the bed, face a couple of inches from Steve’s.

Steve was still grinning when he said, “Get your drunk ass to bed, Bucky.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He leant forwards and kissed Steve. He slid under the covers, and as they kissed again Bucky’s hand was already snaking inside Steve’s pajama pants.

\---

Steve got his chest X-ray (and Bucky too, because they lived in the same room), and the wait for the result made him close to nauseous. Finally, it was clear. Or clear enough. The report said a bunch of bad things about Steve’s chest, but there was no TB. His relief made his knees weak, and he had to cover it with bluster about Steve costing him money.

As soon as they were back home Bucky pulled Steve into a bone-crushing hug.

“I haven’t got TB but I still gotta breathe.”

Bucky relaxed his grip only slightly, “Spend too much of my time thinking that you’re gonna die on me.”

“You made me promise not to. I keep my promises.”

Bucky kissed him, trying to put everything he felt into that kiss, all the love and fear and desperation. That night was the first time he actually asked Steve to fuck him, and he couldn’t help but smile at the surprise and desire in Steve’s expression, and kissed him to cut off the any objection that Steve was about to make.

When they’d been working up to this he’d come hard just with Steve’s fingers inside him. Now with Steve’s dick inside him, seeing Steve’s expression and knowing that he was fighting to stop himself coming just from the sensation of being inside Bucky, fuck, he didn’t have words for this. He wasn’t sure anything could feel as good as this.

That was until a few weeks later when Steve suggested they tried the other way. Steve, back-arched and coming with Bucky’s dick inside him, was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen in his life.

He kissed the sweat from Steve’s brow as they held each other afterwards. “So you liked that, huh?”

“Mnn.”

Steve all warm, dozy and content in his arms was lovely. “Which do you like better?”

“Like everything I do with you.”

Bucky smiled. “Me too, babe.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Doll.” Steve started wrestling with him at that, and Bucky laughed, easily got out of Steve’s grip and pinned him. “Sweetheart.” Steve struggled and Bucky kissed him, punctuating endearments with kisses. “Honey. Darling. Princess.”

“What _you_ are is a jerk.”

\---

He and Steve had talked about work and studying. Argued would probably have been a better word. Eventually, Bucky got Steve to agree that come the fall Steve would go to some extra classes in the daytime, and Bucky would drop out of one of the evening classes. Steve had the talent, and what was the point in having talent if you didn’t nurture it? Bucky, with a combination of competence and charm, was being paid more, so they could stand a reduction in Steve’s income.

It was still warm when classes started up again in the fall, uncomfortably humid to lug all their materials across town, and Bucky offered to carry Steve’s stuff to the class even if he wasn’t going himself.

“Don’t treat me like your girl.”

“Just ‘cause I want to treat you right-”

“No, you want to treat me like- like I’m fragile. I’m not. So don’t.”

Bucky reached out to trace the fading bruise on Steve’s cheek with his thumb, a bruise from another run-in with some asshole in the street. “You were fragile, you wouldn’t still be breathing.”

\---

Their lives settled into a rhythm; work, classes, carefully calculated nights out. And if the curtains were closed when he came back from work, he’d always kiss Steve; always kissed him goodnight, even if it was too hot for them to sleep close to each other. Proper little married couple they were.

He thought that he’d kissed every inch of Steve’s body by now; he’d pushed up Steve’s shirt when Steve was drawing lying on the bed, and had kissed down each nub of his spine; kissed over the ridges of Steve’s hips before they fucked; had even, after Steve had come back from a shower, kissed each of his toes, which was how he found out that Steve had extremely ticklish feet, as that had left him a hysterical squirming mess.

After another year of classes, Steve got a job working in a community arts center, and Bucky was so proud he wanted to take out a damn ad in the paper. He celebrated by taking Steve to his favorite diner (he celebrated by sucking Steve’s dick, teasing it out until Steve came with his fingers dug so hard in Bucky’s scalp that he was worried he might have drawn blood).

For all the secrecy, for all the fear, it was working. He was in love, Steve loved him, there was enough money to keep the bills paid and food on the table, with enough left over so they could keep taking classes. Maybe he was surer about where Steve was going than where he was, but that didn’t matter for the moment.

But there was no way in hell it was going to last.

There was always the possibility that they were going to get caught. Sure, they were careful as all hell, nothing more than a companionable arm around the shoulders anywhere else than behind the bolted door of their room. But that bolt wouldn’t stop a cop kicking the door down if someone had enough suspicion to report them, shit, if they got real unlucky and there was a vice sweep and a cop kicked in their door by mistake at the wrong time- He tried not to think about it.

And the older they got, the more people would be expecting them to get married. He saw the way it worked, looking at the guys he worked with; it was fine to be seen to be fooling around with a different girl every night at his age, but the closer a guy got to thirty, it was seen as odd not to be settling down with one girl.

Then there was that niggle, gnawing at the back of his brain, a constant whisper that this was wrong, that loving Steve the way he did meant he was broken. Half the time he wanted the world to change, that he’d wake up one morning and no-one would care that two guys were in love. But he was a realist. The world wasn’t going to change, but perhaps he could change himself.

(But he’d been trying that for years already, hadn’t he, and everything he’d tried hadn’t changed a damn thing.)

That was why he started up the double dates again. Not that he told Steve that - all he said to Steve was that if they went on double dates, then they could show the world they were going out with girls, and still spend the evening together. But he hoped- he hoped that he’d find a girl he had some spark with, even a feeble glimmer to the electricity he had with Steve. And he hoped that there’d be a girl who’d love Steve, who’d see what Bucky saw, a girl that Steve deserved, and maybe Steve could love her back.

But their double dates were as disastrous as they’d ever been, the only difference being that Bucky would always claim work so he could leave early, and never touched them beyond an unavoidable goodnight kiss. But it kept up their act, kept them invisible, kept the world uninterested in them.

(And under the fear of being caught, there were the old fears - what if this time was the time Steve’s heart gave out, or he didn’t get through the fever, or his chest never loosened up and he stopped breathing, or the asshole who punched him knocked his head and he didn’t stand up again-)

What he wasn’t expecting was a damn world war to be the thing that burst their little bubble. Okay, he’d known what was going on in the rest of the world, but he also knew that the US was staying well out of it. He’d had conversations with Steve about how far Fascism had to creep before the USA got into the fight, and he’d always said that it would have to be an actual attack on the US, and no-one was dumb enough to do that, were they?

He should have known never to underestimate just how dumb people could be.

They were in class when they found out war had been declared. There was general excitement, chatter, people standing up to rush somewhere (who knew where), but Steve just turned to Bucky and said firmly, “I’m joining up.”

“What? Steve, you can’t-”

“I have to. Don’t you see? They’ve got to be stopped.”

“Oh yeah, you’re gonna take down Hitler and the Japanese Emperor on your own.”

“Don’t be stupid, but I’ve got to do my part.”

“Steve, I can barely keep you alive through a winter, let alone you going out and joining the army-”

“I’ve never tried to get really fit. If I work out, go to they gym with you, run, I can get fit enough to get into the army.”

“You cannot be serious.”

“I’m dead serious Bucky. I have to do this.”

As soon as they got home that night he hugged Steve. “You join the army, you’ll just go get yourself killed.”

“It’s war. There are innocent people dying every day- Bucky, they’ve been dying every day for years and we didn’t do anything. Women and children. I got no right to stay safe while that’s happening. So I’m gonna get fit, and I’m gonna join the army.”

Bucky sighed. “Well, you know I’m gonna join up.”

“You don’t have to follow me-”

“Who said I was doing that? I ain’t stupid, I hate bullies almost as much as you do. I know I can look after myself. I gotta join up.”

So he made Steve run laps, trained with him in the gym, keeping an eye out for any sign that this might be pushing Steve too hard, because there was a chance that just training could be enough to kill Steve. So he knew there wasn’t a chance in hell of the recruiters taking Steve. It was a relief that he’d be heading to war on his own, even though he would admit (only to himself) a little fear about the realities of fighting.

He realised that he was casting Steve as his wife, the little lady at home he’d be fighting for. Jesus, Steve had so much spirit to fight, and brains too, but all that was in a body that failed him when he was just trying to get through an average day.

It wasn’t exactly a surprise when he came out 1A and Steve 4F.

“I’m gonna try again.”

“Sure you are. Don’t know when you’re beat.” Bucky could see the set of Steve’s jaw, that determination. It wasn’t his job to say no, the army could do that just fine by themselves. “We’re going out. Met a couple of girls while you were out running. I- if I’m going away tomorrow, I want you to have... someone needs to look out for you while I’m not around.”

“I don’t need looking after, Bucky.” But he still agreed to coming out on the date.

At least Sally-from-Iowa was polite enough not to be rude to Steve, though she wasn’t impressed with him either. So they went out, he danced, they walked the girls home, then headed for home themselves. The moment the door was closed Bucky had Steve pressed against it, kissing him like his life depended on it.

He whispered in Steve’s ear. “Fuck me. Hard. ‘Cause you’re gonna be a soldier and you can give it to me hard, can’t ya? Fuck me so as I can feel it all the way through training.”

He let Steve push him back, pull the covers off the bed, push him onto the floor, play the big man. They fucked face to face because he needed to see Steve, needed every contact with him because they were going to be apart. Before this, it had only ever been a few nights every winter in the orphanage when Steve would end up quarantined in the infirmary, otherwise they never spent time apart. He didn’t know what he was going to do, and he needed this, being part of him, before they were separated.

They wrapped around each other in bed. Bucky ran his fingers through Steve’s hair, planted gentle kisses on his neck, before saying, “I- uh. I’m kinda wondering if the army’ll… fix me. Make it so as I don’t want this.”

“You got nothing that needs fixing, Buck.”

Bucky looked into Steve’s eyes, feeling the prickle of tears in his own eyes. “Wish the world was like you think it oughta be. It’s a helluva lot better than the one we’ve got.”

Steve half-smiled. “So you agree it’s the world that needs fixing, not you?”

Bucky rolled his eyes, but he wasn’t going to start an argument on their last night together.

\---

Basic training put Bucky through the grinder. He’d thought he was fit and he could fight, and he’d been dead wrong. But he did a helluva lot better than most of the guys, and was put forward to be an NCO, given extra training, singled out as a sniper.

When he got on the train back to New York, stripes fresh on his arm, he wasn’t even trying to hide the swagger in his step. He hadn’t thought about screwing Steve all through basic (though he hadn’t thought of much that wasn’t sleep or a hot shower or a decent meal). It was evening when he got back, and he walked up the stairs of their apartment block thinking that he’d drop his bag, take Steve out and hope that some of the magic of the uniform that had had girls blushing and giggling when he looked at them all the way home would rub off on him.

He opened the door, and Steve turned from the table and smiled at him.

Fuck.

He felt that smile like it was wired to his bones and his dick. He dropped his bag, kicked the door shut and bolted it, and grabbed Steve from the table, bodily picked him up to pin him against the wall and kiss him desperately. Steve wrapped his legs around Bucky, hands clinging to his shoulders, kissing him back with equal desperation.

He needed to get Steve naked, needed to fuck him through the floor. He carried Steve over to the bed, pulled the covers off onto the floor, and got the both of them down there. There was an awkward fumbling as they both tried to get their clothes off without stopping kissing or touching each other, until finally they were naked, hard and pressed against each other. Bucky reached for the nightstand blindly, found that Steve hadn’t moved the vaseline while he was away, slicked his fingers and started working Steve open. Steve was arching up into his fingers, and Bucky wanted in there _now_ , but he wasn’t going to go hurting Steve. When he finally thought Steve was ready he pulled his fingers out and pushed his dick home. Steve tensed up, and Bucky thought that perhaps he’d gone too fast, but after a moment Steve was moving against him and that was all the encouragement that Bucky needed to fuck him hard and fast, hand wrapped round Steve’s dick.

Steve came, mouth open in a silent cry, and looking at that, that was enough to bring Bucky over the edge.

He held Steve as his breathing evened out, planting soft kisses at his jawline, tasting his skin. Steve turned his head, and Bucky kissed him again, desperation gone, pure adoration left.

“Guess the army didn’t fix me.”

Steve sighed exaggeratedly, “Because you don’t need to be fixed, idiot.”

“Jerk. I missed you. I wish- god, Steve, I wish I didn’t. No, that’s wrong, I wish I missed you like a friend. Not like this. I wish-”

“Stop. Even if you were right, and you’re not, wishing doesn’t change anything. You just- we just make the best of what we got.”

Bucky smiled at Steve. “You’re the best thing I ever had.”

“Dumb sap. Tell me about training. I want to know what I’m letting myself in for.”

Jeez, was Steve still trying? What the hell would make him quit? But Bucky didn’t want to spoil the moment, and didn’t restart the old argument, just told Steve about Basic.

He only had two days, and he wasn’t going to waste that. But he still wanted to see Steve with a nice girl, because he could hardly stand to think about leaving him on his own. So while Steve was at work, he went out, let the uniform work its magic on top of his old moves, flirted with he didn’t know how many girls. But none of them were _right_ , he needed to find a girl who was petite, pretty, clever, believed in the same things that Steve did (standing up for the little guy, making sure no one went hungry, all of that).

He settled for petite and pretty and kinda dumb, who came with a friend who was busty and not pretty (but that wasn’t where he was looking, so who cared). Both of them wanted to dance with him and not Steve, and Steve made his excuses and left early. It took Bucky an hour to work out a way to dump both of them that didn’t look too suspicious.

He didn’t waste any of the rest of his leave on anyone who wasn’t Steve.

Then it was back to the army, and there he had no problem pretending to be a regular guy. No distraction. No-one who got under his skin the way Steve did (there were guys he could imagine fucking, guys he’d take over some of the girls around the camp, but he could ignore that).

He was going to be a damn good soldier. If they wanted him to be a sniper, he was going to be the goddamned best. Focus on that, not on anything else.

\---

Orders. Europe. Twenty-four hours leave and then gone, god knows for how long (and however much he tried not to think about it, there was the little voice that said he might never be coming back). His last shot to find a girl to look after Steve before he shipped out, and he didn’t make a good choice. And then Steve was going to try and get into the army again, and he couldn’t stand to watch that, so he took both of the girls out dancing.

They didn’t sleep much that night. Steve was quiet, and Bucky thought he was worried, but he couldn’t ask, because… because if they started talking about that, the fear that Bucky was keeping bolted securely inside might all spill out.

In the morning he couldn’t stop kissing and touching Steve, because this was it, this could be the last time ever. He ended up having to run most of the way to the station, and when he caught up with a bunch of guys he knew from his unit he didn’t correct them when they assumed he’d been with a girl.

London was enough to distract him from the weight of his fear. The place was just masses of young people thrown together under the constant threat of death - it was like one big crazy party, and an air raid wasn’t going to stop the drinking, the dancing and the screwing.

Italy was mud and work and slog so he couldn’t think of anything other than getting through each day. Then it was all too real. He’d been hit with the blood and brains of Johnnie, guy he’d called a friend, kid from Queens with a steady girl and job waiting for him as soon as he got home, and he was only the first to die. They were outgunned, overwhelmed and captured.

There were rules about how prisoners were treated. The Staff Sergeant told the guys who’d taken them prisoner that as soon as they were asked to work.

Their guards shot him in the head.

So they worked, building a huge plane, bigger than any allied plane. And every so often a short civilian would pick someone out and take them away. Somewhere between a day or three days later four of them would be called to take the body down to the furnaces.

Then the guy chose him, and-

_pain-_   
_hot-_   
_cold-_   
_the ceiling is bubbling-_   
_pain-_   
_JamesBuchananBarnes325575_   
_why can I hear mom she’s dead-_   
_pain-_   
_hot-_   
_can’t feel my hands and feet do I still have hands and feet-_   
_pain-_   
_going to die here I don’t want to die-_   
_cold-_   
_JamesBuchananBarnes325575_

“Bucky?”

“Steve?” Because it was Steve, different, but Steve, because he could feel the pull towards him even though he could barely think or feel anything.

It was only after hours of marching back to camp that he convinced himself that Steve wasn’t a hallucination. Because Steve was- he was a fucking walking Adonis, he looked like a hero, and he acted like one. He’d jumped through fire and brought Bucky back from the dead. It took a while to get used to the idea that someone like that might just be real, and not only that, was Steve Rogers who last he saw was a hundred pounds of fragile body and grim determination.

And the way that dame in uniform in the camp looked at him, Steve had found himself a girl.

It was all debriefings and activity after that, no privacy to talk, to even get much more out of Steve about what the hell had happened to him. A brief and very public argument about volunteering for medical experiments was sternly broken up by Steve’s girl, and Bucky was dragged off for yet another debriefing, this one mainly that no-one was supposed to know that Steve had gotten to be how he was through anything other than a few square meals and nights in the gym. At least Bucky got to know the basics of what actually happened, and why Steve was a one-off.

When they got back to London Steve said that he’d found them a private room somewhere, so they didn’t have to get back before curfew.

Of course he was following Steve back into the fight. Steve might have been big enough to look after himself, but it was obvious that the serum hadn’t done anything about the stupid. Sure, he was grateful that Steve had pulled him out of that place, but a one-man mission into the middle of an enemy base, even if you were a super-soldier was just about the dumbest thing that anyone could do. So Steve needed him to watch his back and talk some sense into him, while Steve was going to be everything that he should be. He was going to change the world (the number of people who idolised Captain America, he probably already had).

Then Steve’s girl walked into the bar, turning heads in a red dress, and he had to flirt with her. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t interested, he’d never been interested when Steve was standing right next to him. But she ignored him, eyes only for Steve.

He didn’t think that he had ever failed so badly with a girl before. Is that what this was going to be? Not only to lose Steve, but lose everything else as well?

Bucky finished his drink, said that he wanted to turn in, and Steve went and said that he should be getting some sleep before the morning briefing as well. It was a transparent lie, and he guessed that Steve wanted to get him somewhere private before having a very gentlemanly talk that he wasn’t going to judge but he had a girl now, and there wasn’t going to be any more of that going on between them.

Once the door was safely shut and locked behind them, Bucky said, “So the army really did make a man of you.”

Steve’s brow creased, just slightly, and Bucky’s heart sank. He’d screwed up, he didn’t know how, but he had.

Steve waved a hand vaguely up and down his body. “This? You think this is what it takes to make someone a man?”

“No, Steve, hell no, you were twice the guy I was when you were six inches shorter than me.”

“Then what did you mean?”

“You and that Agent Carter. She seems…. seems like the kind of girl you deserve.”

“You… you think I don’t want you any more? Buck, uh, I know this body is different, and if you don’t want me anymore then I’ll not say another thing about it, but I still love you, and-”

It took a second for what Steve was saying to sink in, then Bucky was across the room and kissing Steve. Jesus, Steve’s whole body was so hard, sure he’d known about the muscles when Steve had practically picked him up, but he hadn’t really felt it. Steve was holding him with those big hands, cradling him like Bucky had held dames (had held Steve).

“Buck, missed you, they told me you were dead, I couldn’t-”

“No, Steve, we ain’t talking about that.” He started unbuttoning Steve’s jacket. “Let me look at what the army made.”

“You first.”

“Bossy.”

“Senior officer.”

“You should not be making that sound that damn sexy.” He stepped back from Steve and undressed. He could have drawn it out, but he really wasn’t in the mood to tease. “There. Same as you left me.” He had more bruises and cuts and burns and scars, but he hoped that if he pretended they weren’t there then Steve wouldn’t ask about them. “Now you. _Sir_.”

Steve stripped down, and fuck, he was something else. “I’d say you looked like a Greek statue, but they ain’t got half the muscles you do.” He stepped forwards and wrapped a hand around Steve’s dick. “And you’re a helluva lot better endowed.” He kissed Steve as he stroked him, “Made that bigger as well.”

“Fuck me.”

The way Steve said it, it was hesitant, like he was expecting Bucky to say no. “You sure you don’t want it the other way-”

“No. I- I just need you. Please.”

They pulled the covers off the bed, Steve lay down and Bucky straddled him. “Anything else change with that serum? Come three times in one night?”

Steve swallowed. “Can come three times without getting soft.”

“Fuck.” Then Bucky grinned. “Kinda sounds like a challenge to me.”

He leant down to kiss Steve, then kissed down his neck, one hand still lazily stroking Steve’s erection. A thought occurred to him, “You don’t keep bruises long at all, do you?”

“Anything less than hitting me with a tyre iron and they’d be gone in the morning.”

Bucky put his mouth to Steve’s neck and sucked (low enough that if Steve was wrong the marks would still be hidden by his collar). He felt Steve’s reaction, moved his mouth to suck lower, to leave a string of marks, claim him even though no-one could ever see. He’d never marked Steve before, not just in case someone saw, but because he’d wanted to be the one to protect, not the one to leave bruises. He drew back to look at his handiwork. The latest mark had bloomed a little, but the first ones were already faded completely, just the damp mark of his mouth showing where he’d been. He bent his head to Steve’s shoulder, mouthed and sucked a little, then bit hard into the muscle as he squeezed Steve’s dick. Steve arched and came with a quiet intake of breath.

“So you _do_ like getting punched.”

Steve’s eyes were dark, “Only when you do it.”

Fuck, that went straight to Bucky’s dick, but Steve was still as hard as ever in Bucky’s hand, and Bucky intended to really see what this new body could do.“You meant it about coming and keeping going.”

“Wouldn’t be any point in boasting if you were about to test it.”

“Haven’t even _started_ testing yet.”

He bent down again, and started to kiss and lick his way along every single one of those perfect muscles, scraping his teeth on Steve’s skin every so often. He looked up at Steve as he licked his come off his stomach, slowly, smirking as he did it.

“ _Bucky…_ ” Steve’s reverential tone sent shivers down Bucky’s spine.

“You want me to fuck you, you’d better have-”

Steve reached behind him and passed a small tin of vaseline. Bucky grinned, slicked up a finger and slid it down Steve’s ass crack and inside. Jeez, Steve was tight, was that the serum? He pressed in deeper, felt Steve’s reaction as he stroked the spot inside he knew so well. He continued kissing down Steve’s stomach, to Steve’s groin and thighs, avoiding Steve’s dick.

“Don’t tease, there’s a war on.”

Bucky just grinned and licked up Steve’s dick, before fastening his mouth around the tip and taking him in deep. He sucked, curling his tongue around the tip as he did so, and between his tongue and his finger, Steve was coming again.

Bucky kept sucking, slid a second finger into Steve, and supersoldier or not, Steve was close to whimpering with the stimulation. He wanted to fuck Steve so bad, but he wanted to take him apart completely before he did. He sucked Steve until his jaw hurt, until he could feel the sweat running down Steve’s legs, until Steve was shaking and coming again.

That was three times, and Steve still wasn’t flagging. Bucky pulled off and grinned at him, added a third finger, ignored the way his own dick was aching for release. He knelt up and looked at Steve, who was breathing heavily, covered in a sheen of sweat, looking close on mouthwatering. Steve put a big hand around Bucky’s neck, to pull him down for a kiss. He’d loved Steve’s hands when they were delicate and could do the most… _intricate_ things to his body, but he loved these new strong hands as well, hands that were still artistic but could punch a guy into the middle of next week.

He hadn’t stopped moving his fingers inside Steve and Steve was pushing up to rub his dick against Bucky’s thigh. Bucky pushed himself up again, wrapped his hand around Steve’s dick concentrated on jerking him off. It took a little longer this time, and after he came Steve was starting to soften a little. Bucky wasn’t having any of that, licked along his dick by way of encouragement.

Then Bucky spread Steve’s legs, slicked his own dick, removed his fingers and slid inside him in one motion. He was so close he had to screw his eyes shut and bite his lip, thinking of codes to stop himself from coming. It took him a long time to get control, and as he opened his eyes he saw that Steve looked like he was about to start laughing. He narrowed his eyes at him.

Steve grinned and said, “You can’t see you.”

“Oh yeah, and you don’t make dumb faces _at all_.” He rolled his hips to make the point, and was rewarded by Steve’s half-way-to-orgasm face. But, fuck, once he’d started to move he couldn’t stop, and he was soon holding Steve’s hips so hard it’d bruise a normal guy, and slamming into him like he could bury himself in there.

When he knew he was close, he wrapped one hand around Steve’s dick, stroked him so they came almost simultaneously, a wash of pleasure so intense that it was difficult to swallow the cry he wanted to make.

He dropped to lie on top of Steve, no worries now about being too heavy. Those big arms were around him again, and all he could think was _this is where I was meant to be_.

Then Steve poked him in the ribs and said, “We’re not sleeping on the floor when we have an actual bed.”

“‘M nice and comfy here, thanks.”

He felt more than heard Steve’s exaggerated sigh, and then had to swallow a cry of surprise, because Steve stood up, picking him up in one fluid motion as he did so, and gently put him on the bed. Like he weighed absolutely nothing. Fuck, he’d picked Steve up before, and it hadn’t been too difficult, but not like that, that had just been effortless. He was still trying to get his head around that as Steve got a washcloth, washed the both of them down, put the covers back on the bed, switched the light off and slid into bed next to Bucky.

They curled around each other. Steve said, “You know we can’t do this again-”

“Yeah. _Captain America_ doesn’t sleep with guys.”

Steve sighed and kissed him gently. “I wouldn’t care what they’d do to me. But I don’t know what they’d do to you, and I can’t risk that.”

“That Agent Carter’s a swell girl.”

“No. I’m not leading a woman on when I’m in love with someone else.”

“If I recall, all she said was that you could go dancing when all this was over. Perhaps you’ll feel different-.”

“We’re not having this argument again if tonight’s all I get with you.”

“You get me watching your back on whatever dumbass mission you get us into.”

“Not like this.”

Bucky kissed him again. “What do you want? If you want another round you’re gonna have to give me more recovery time-”

“No- I-” Steve took a deep breath. “I love you. I love being with you. I- When we were on tour in the US, most nights I’d get a double bed to myself, and waking up in a big bed on my own was- I- er, even if you’d told me tonight that you didn’t want this any more, I’d have asked you to stay, so I didn’t wake up on my own.”

That made Bucky tighten his hold on Steve. “I had my way, I’d wake up in a big bed with you every morning. ‘Course, if I had my way, then there’d be no nosey neighbours and no creaky springs, and no air raids-”

Steve chuckled, “Nosey neighbours are worse than the Luftwaffe?”

“I’d say yeah, but that’d just be asking for an air raid siren.” He pressed a kiss into Steve’s skin. “Tell me about being on tour.”

“It was dull. You’ll fall asleep.”

“I wanna fall asleep listening to you talk.”

Steve stroked Bucky’s hair as he told him about being Captain America, of going across America, chorus girls and press appearances and kissing babies.

Bucky was tired, and was fighting sleep and losing. He’d follow Steve to hell and back, shit, if they were going after Hydra that was probably what they were about to do. And there was still that lead weight in his stomach, that feeling that he wasn’t walking out of this war alive, all the more pronounced for what he’d already survived. He pressed another kiss into Steve’s skin and silently promised that he would do everything he could to make sure Steve walked out of this war, even if he didn’t. Sleep was overtaking him, and he could hear Steve, feel the vibrations of him talking, but couldn’t make sense of the words anymore. The last thing he thought of before finally going to sleep was the soft light of a Brooklyn morning spilling through their curtains, light that had lit up Steve’s blonde hair like a halo as he slept.


End file.
